Alex Janvier- Undeniably, We Lived in Fear
So we’re supposed to be going to school to learn things, but when you live in fear you don’t learn very well. You know, you’re always scared, always scared to do the wrong thing. And then these teachers had long sticks ya know, about a yard long, and I understand they’re hickory. The stick, they don’t break off too easy, and your little hands burn when those things land on it, or on the back, or on the butt. That’s the history of residential school, and I’m sure that all of us here in this room today, we can go back. We can remember grandparents, parents, and even children who have been there.
And undeniably, we lived in fear.
Then we have this other funny thing, government control called Indian Affairs. They control me like you wouldn’t believe.
I became, I’m a famous artist today, because of that school, because I didn’t want to learn everything. I became good at doing artwork, and I begin to express the deep hidden inside, the side that Alex wanted to express, but I could only do it to the art.
The rest of the program was denial of my language, culture, beliefs and even the belief in the Great Spirit. And they said our grandparents were evil, they work for the devil.
I said, “that’s my grandmother and my grandfather, and I’ve never known them to ever say any word that was evil.” And yet in that place, that’s what we were taught. We were made to make to believe that that’s what was going on back home.
We were sent away 10 months of the year, and we were… it was just like being in jail. We couldn’t go back home. When our parents come and visit, and we were treated different, we were treated for the first time really nice.
– Alex Janvier
Notes:
Alex Janvier Testimony. SC141_part03. Shared at Alberta National Event (ABNE) Sharing Circles. March 21, 2014. National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation holds copyright. https://archives.nctr.ca/SC141_part03
